Crypto stocks are caught in a brutal free fall, mirroring the market-wide slump in Bitcoin and altcoins.

Coinbase, the biggest crypto exchange in the U.S., has crashed from nearly $350 per share in November to $190. This decline has brought its market cap from $86 billion to $48 billion—a $38 billion wipe out.

Michael Saylor’s Strategy, has also shed billions of dollars in value. Its market cap dipped from a high of $106 billion last year to $79 billion today. The company, formerly known as MicroStrategy, has continued to accumulate Bitcoin and now holds 499,226 Bitcoins in its balance sheet. 

Robinhood stock crashed from $66.85 earlier this year to $45, erasing $18 billion in value. While Robinhood is known for providing retail trading, it has become a major player in the crypto market. It hopes to play a bigger role in the sector when it completes its BitStamp acquisition later this year. 

Bitcoin (BTC) mining stocks have also plunged as the struggling BTC price hurts margins. Mara Holdings, formerly known as Marathon Digital, has lost over $4.6 billion in valuation. Other similar companies like Riot Blockchain, Core Scientific, CleanSpark, Hut 8 Mining, and TeraWulf have also shed billions in valuation.

Bitcoin, altcoin prices plummet

These crypto stocks have dropped because of the ongoing decline of Bitcoin and other altcoins. According to CoinMarketCap, the market cap of all cryptocurrencies has dropped from over $3.7 trillion in 2024 to $2.7 trillion today. 

Bitcoin has dropped from $109,300 in January to $85,000 at last check. Most altcoins have done worse. For example, Solana meme coins have shed over $18 billion in value as their combined market cap sank. 

Crypto prices and crypto stocks have dropped despite the Trump administration’s pledge to be highly supportive of the sector via initiatives like a Strategic Bitcoin Reserve. 

The Securities and Exchange Commission has also enacted some friendly policies and ended most of the lawsuits in the industry. It has ended lawsuits brought on companies like Coinbase, Ripple Labs, and Kraken.

Whether these crypto stocks bounce back remains to be seen. Crypto analysts have a mixed outlook on the industry. Some observers expect Bitcoin’s price to recover, with Standard Chartered predicting it will hit $500,000 over time.

Ki Young Ju, CryptoQuant’s founder, estimates that the crypto bull run has ended, noting that all indicators were bearish.

After reaching an all-time high above $100,000, the Bitcoin price has entered a multi-week downtrend. This correction has naturally raised questions about whether Bitcoin is still aligned with the 2017 bull cycle. Here we’ll analyze the data to assess how closely Bitcoin’s current price action correlates with previous bull markets, and what we can expect next for BTC.

Bitcoin Price Trends in 2025 vs. 2017 Bull Cycle

Bitcoin’s price trajectory since the cycle lows set during the 2022 bear market has shown remarkable similarities to the 2015–2017 cycle, the bull market that culminated in Bitcoin reaching $20,000 in December 2017. However, Bitcoin’s recent downtrend marks the first major divergence from the 2017 pattern. If Bitcoin were still tracking the 2017 cycle, it should have been rallying to new all-time highs over the past month, instead, Bitcoin has been moving sideways and declining, suggesting that the correlation may be weakening.

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Despite the recent divergence, the historical correlation between Bitcoin’s current cycle and the 2017 cycle remains surprisingly high. The correlation between the current cycle and the 2015–2017 cycle was around 92% earlier this year. The recent price divergence has reduced the correlation slightly to 91%, still an extremely high figure for financial markets.

How Bitcoin Market Behavior Echoes 2017 Cycle Patterns

The MVRV Ratio is a key indicator of investor behavior. It measures the relationship between Bitcoin’s current market price and the average cost basis of all BTC held on the network. When the MVRV ratio rises sharply, it indicates that investors are sitting on significant unrealized profits, a condition that often precedes market tops. When the ratio declines toward the realized price, it signals that Bitcoin is trading close to the average acquisition price of investors, often marking a bottoming phase.

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The recent decline in the MVRV ratio reflects Bitcoin’s correction from all-time highs, however, the MVRV ratio remains structurally similar to the 2017 cycle with an early bull market rally, followed by multiple sharp corrections, and as such, the correlation remains at 80%.

Bitcoin Price Correlation with 2017 Bull Cycle Data

One possible explanation for the recent divergence is the influence of data lag. For example, Bitcoin’s price action has shown a strong correlation with Global Liquidity, the total supply of money in major economies; however, historical analysis shows that changes in liquidity often take around 2 months to reflect in Bitcoin’s price action.

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By applying a 30-day lag to Bitcoin’s price action relative to the 2017 cycle, the correlation increases to 93%, which would be the highest recorded correlation between the two cycles. The lag-adjusted pattern suggests that Bitcoin could soon resume the 2017 trajectory, implying that a major rally could be on the horizon.

What 2017 Bull Cycle Signals Mean for Bitcoin Price Today

History may not repeat itself, but it often rhymes. Bitcoin’s current cycle may not deliver 2017-style exponential gains, but the underlying market psychology remains strikingly similar. If Bitcoin resumes its correlation with the lagging 2017 cycle, the historical precedent suggests that Bitcoin could soon recover from the current correction, and a sharp upward move could follow.

Explore live data, charts, indicators, and in-depth research to stay ahead of Bitcoin’s price action at Bitcoin Magazine Pro.

Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only and should not be considered financial advice. Always do your own research before making any investment decisions.

On March 20, investor and entrepreneur Anthony Pompliano stated on Fox News, “There’s a global race going on–Russia, Abu Dhabi, El Salvador, Bhutan–all these other countries are trying to buy Bitcoin… the same way that there was a space race there’s now a Bitcoin race.”

The idea of a Bitcoin “race” is now a reality as world leaders actively discuss the urgency of either establishing digital asset reserves or embracing cryptocurrency as legal tender.

El Salvador, in 2021, became the first country to make Bitcoin legal tender, purchasing over 2,000 Bitcoin as part of a national reserve to foster financial inclusion and economic growth. The move has been both celebrated and criticized due to Bitcoin’s volatility. Similarly, in 2022, the Central African Republic became the second country to adopt Bitcoin, viewing the cryptocurrency as a tool to improve economic development and financial inclusion in one of the world’s least developed nations.

Both countries’ actions reflect growing interest in Bitcoin as an alternative financial strategy. It’s hard-capped at 21 million, and in 10 years, most of it will be mined.

The theory is that the countries considering Bitcoin a valuable reserve asset will strive to establish as much ownership of the total BTC supply as possible. 

Proponents believe scarcity and growing demand will drive Bitcoin’s value, making large BTC holders influential.

What Saylor says…

One of the most prominent Bitcoin evangelists, Michael Saylor, said that 78% of the U.S. was bought for $40 million at some point. The former CEO of MicroStrategy referred to various land acquisitions, such as the Louisiana Purchase of 1803 to illustrate why the U.S. government should buy Bitcoin now when it’s “cheap.”

In a recent speech, Saylor called the next decade “a digital gold rush” and compared Bitcoin to the Manhattan Project, dubbing it “digital energy.”

“Today, Bitcoin represents the digital capital network, controlling 99% of power within the cryptocurrency ecosystem,” he said. “The U.S. government recognizes only Bitcoin as legitimate digital capital. To secure the future of cyberspace and maintain global financial dominance, America must adopt Bitcoin strategically. Only Bitcoin—and U.S. Treasuries—have the liquidity and global trust required to serve as reliable reserve assets worldwide.” 

No wonder Saylor has been vocally supportive of government officials pushing to increase the U.S.’s BTC stockpile.

President Donald Trump, Republican Sen. Cynthia Lummis, and Bo Hines, the Executive Director of the President’s Council of Advisors on Digital Assets, have all expressed a desire to increase the U.S.’s Bitcoin reserve.

Like Saylor, Pompliano (among the most vocal crypto advocates in the U.S.) considers the Trump administration’s focus on Bitcoin dominance important.

Speaking about the future price of Bitcoin, Pompliano said during a Fox News appearance that he doesn’t know when BTC will hit one million. However, he is seemingly confident that, like gold, its value will increase from where it currently is today.

At last check, Bitcoin is trading at just above $84,000. 

“I think people are drastically underestimating how maniacal they are going to be about buying Bitcoin,” Pompliano said. “Everyone thinks it’s cute that they put 200,000 Bitcoin over here and now we have this reserve — they are going to continue to buy Bitcoin.”

Who participates in the Bitcoin race?

Apart from the U.S., Pompliano named Russia, El Salvador, Bhutan, and the United Arab Emirates. Indeed, all of these countries reportedly have Bitcoin holdings, but not necessarily all of them explicitly expressed their desire to buy more.

It is not quite clear how much crypto Russia holds. However, it is known that Russia has large-scale mining operations while local companies use crypto for international trade and dodging Western sanctions.

Pompliano neglected to mention several leading Bitcoin holders, including China, which is the second biggest BTC owner after the U.S.

The United Kingdom and Ukraine currently follow China, according to BitBo’s Bitcoin Treasuries page.

All these countries have different strategies:

• North Korea’s hackers steal hundreds of millions of dollars worth of crypto from crypto exchanges.
• The UK holds crypto, seized while dismantling a high-scale money-laundering operation.
• Ukraine became a notable Bitcoin holder through donations made after the intensification of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict in 2022. 
• The U.S. intends to confiscate Bitcoin and crypto assets from criminal cases. It’s worth noting that many individual states are exploring the creation of local-level reserves.

More than that, some corporations, most notably Strategy (previously MicroStrategy) and asset manager BlackRock, are among the world’s biggest Bitcoin holders, capable of competing with leading nations in terms of Bitcoin dominance. Both firms own or manage around 500,000 Bitcoins (over 2% of the total supply). As of March 2025, no country holds even half that amount. 

Many countries are opting out

European countries have been cautious and innovative in their interactions with blockchain solutions. For instance, Estonia is one of the world’s pioneers in adopting blockchain for elections and healthcare data management. However, the EU countries take a conservative stance when it comes to crypto reserves. High volatility and low liquidity are the main reasons for rejecting Bitcoin’s reserve establishment. 

Similar reasons are cited by Switzerland, South Korea, Japan, and other countries that seem unbothered by America’s passion for winning in the Bitcoin musical chairs game. Germany went so far to sell thousands of Bitcoin.

Germany sold all their #Bitcoin at $54,000.

If they had waited, they could have made an extra $990 million.

Losers pic.twitter.com/2G8iRFhzn9

— Crypto Rover (@rovercrc) November 6, 2024

Crypto.news asked Genius Group, a company using Bitcoin as a corporate reserve, how they time the market.

“As fundamental believers in the long-term potential of Bitcoin, we don’t try to time the market, but rather buy and hold with the intention of never selling,” a spokesperson responded.

Let’s assume the so-called Bitcoin race exists, as Pompliano described it. If we compare it to space or the Manhattan Project, we must ask ourselves: Were the countries that didn’t have spacecraft or atomic weapons in the 20th century left with nothing?